Combs, Richard, "The First Cut is Still the Bleakest:
The Wild Bunch
Directed by Sam Peckinpah/
My Darling Clementine
Directed by John Ford," in
Times Literary Supplement
(London), no. 4832, 10 November 1995.

My Darling Clementine
is considered the archetype of the classic western. In retelling the
familiar story of the Earp brothers standing up to the evil Clanton
family, director John Ford proved Hollywood genre films would become great
cultural artefacts. However, Ford, one of the industry's most
honored directors, is usually better remembered for other masterworks.
While
My Darling Clementine
is considered one of his better films, it is only one of many in a truly
remarkable career.

Ford, however, did not want to direct this classic work originally. After
World War II Ford, like many of Hollywood's highly rated directors,
formed an independent company, in this case Argosy Pictures. But he still
owed Twentieth Century-Fox one more film. (Fox's production chief
Darryl F. Zanuck tried to tempt Ford to renegotiate his Fox contract for a
guaranteed $600,000 per year plus limited freedom but Ford refused.)
Zanuck assigned Ford to
My Darling Clementine
starring Fox stars Henry Fonda and Victor Mature. Shooting began in
Monument Valley in May, 1946, and was completed within 45 days. Zanuck
found Ford's version too long, and the story unclear, so he cut 30
minutes, and re-structured some of the remaining material. Released in
November, 1946 the film received favorable reviews, and earned
respectable, but not record-breaking revenues.

The structure of
My Darling Clementine
is straightforward, and symmetrical, opening with the ominous meeting of
the Earps with the Clantons, and closing with the gun-fight at the OK
Corral (and Wyatt's half-hearted promise to return). All this seems
to take place in three or four days. Although the events are grounded in
history (Ford claimed to have gotten this version directly from friend
Wyatt Earp), the details were transformed to make a popular film. The Doc
Holliday figure was transfigured the most. Like central characters in
The Searchers
and
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
, Holliday tragically stands between primitivism and civilization. Unlike
the Earps, this character fails to find a way to reconcile his place in
the changing world, and turns to alcohol and a desire for death.

Disintegration of the family was a dominant theme in Ford's work
prior to World War II. In
My Darling Clementine
the contrast between the Earps and Clantons is clearly drawn, with death
at the ultimate shootout predestined. The Earps are diametrically opposed
to the Clantons, yet strong similarities exist. In both cases, the father
holds powerful authority. "Old Man" Clanton beats his sons
with a whip, bullying them like animals. The Earps, however, are more
civilized, and continually appeal to their unseen father ("How will
we tell Pa?"). In the end Wyatt and Morgan, the surviving brothers
choose to return to tell Pa of recent events rather than remain to help
civilize Tombstone.

My Darling Clementine
seems to present a well known story, set in the familiar context of the
western. Upon closer examination of the film, however, one can still see
the confusion Zanuck must have sensed, such as the sequence in which the
Earps come to town. Wyatt settles down for a shave when gunshots arouse
him. He goes through the hotel (next to the barber shop) and emerges, in a
medium long shot, alone on the sidewalk. A barber pole serves as a
reference to locate him in the darkness. Wyatt goes across the street to
the source of the trouble. We see him with the Oriental Saloon in the
background, its doors clearly seen in deep space. Wyatt enters the
Oriental saloon to capture Indian Joe, the perpetrator of the trouble.
Wyatt then gathers the barber from the crowd of spectators and seeks a
continuation of his shave. Later in the film we learn, through several
long establishing shots, that there is
no
Oriental saloon on the other side of the street. This absence of the
continual "referential focus" disrupts
the film's visual rhythm, setting this sequence apart from the
rest of the film. There are numerous other examples of visual
discontinuity in this film, all violating rules of classical Hollywood
style. Indeed in this seemingly simple work Ford develops a complex visual
pattern of stability and disruption in the world of Tombstone. Ford seems
to be foreshadowing his autocritiques of the western genre made throughout
the 1950s and 1960s.

In its use of generic elements
My Darling Clementine
suggests the western myth might not be as stable as it was prior to World
War II. Although in the end the film seems to promise the formation of a
utopian community, the western hero does not seem to be able to reconcile
his individual and social roles. He rides off in the closing sequence with
only a vague suggestion he will return to Clementine and the community. To
further play on the hero's ambiguous character Ford continually
reminds us that he does not fit in.
My Darling Clementine
's most cited sequence is not its elaborate gunfight, but rather a
dance in which Wyatt Earp displays his lack of grace on the dance floor.
This Eastern ritual is here to stay, whether the western hero fits in or
not. Ford seems to have been influenced in
My Darling Clementine
by his recent military experience during World War II. Despite the fact
Ford made seven films about the United States Cavalry,
My Darling Clementine
seems to be his most militarist western, both in theme and action. The
Earps represent a new type of law—cold and calculating. They
operate within the law, yet are always clearly able to kill in a most
efficient manner. Family ties and a sense of justice seem all that is
necessary to justify action. Civilization defends itself only by
obliterating the other side, and then leaving when the job is done, much
as the popular image of the role of the American military during World War
II.

In the end, in structure, theme and style Ford seems to be undercutting
the anarchic spirit of the western, so celebrated in 1939 with his
Stagecoach
. The style seems classical but upon closer inspection is not. The themes
seem classical, but contradictions and loose ends abound. Even closure,
the Hollywood system's point of "wrapping the
package," is confused and ambiguous.
My Darling Clementine
represents the work of a filmmaker ready to break out of the studio
system and go onto more complex projects, as Ford would. In an uneven path
he would make his way to his masterworks, westerns of complexity and
ambiguity:
The Searchers
(1956) and
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
(1962).
My Darling Clementine
, a masterwork in its own right, foreshadows Ford's greatest films.